Photo
August 28, 2010
The last two sets of slides and negatives I’ve recieved have been really emotional to look through and meant a lot to the people who sent me them. So, to lighten the mood a bit, here’s a photo from Tabby, who kindly answered these questions.  Who, where and when did this negative come from?I took this at another Whitby Gothic Weekend in 1998. It is taken in the Metropole hotel.Who is in this photo? In this photo is Becky (now Flint’s wife, but at the time Will’s girlfriend), a random pretty lady’s arse, and G’s hand and zebra trousers. You can just see Will in the far right. The pretty lady was dressed in leopard print and had leopard print body paint on too.Who took the photo? I took the photo as a dare. All night G had been admiring the woman’s arse, and we made it a silly game to try and get a photo of her bum without her knowing. It would have been perfect if G had not decided to grab his drink at the same time. Incidentally, we had the cleanest table in the place that night as the young glass collector kept coming by for an ogle!Where is the camera that took it?This was probably taken on a disposable camera from Boots. I went through a ton of them that weekend as I had forgotten my proper camera. What made you send me this negative?It has an arse on it. Everyone likes arses.

The last two sets of slides and negatives I’ve recieved have been really emotional to look through and meant a lot to the people who sent me them. So, to lighten the mood a bit, here’s a photo from Tabby, who kindly answered these questions. 


Who, where and when did this negative come from?
I took this at another Whitby Gothic Weekend in 1998. It is taken in the Metropole hotel.

Who is in this photo? 

In this photo is Becky (now Flint’s wife, but at the time Will’s girlfriend), a random pretty lady’s arse, and G’s hand and zebra trousers. You can just see Will in the far right. The pretty lady was dressed in leopard print and had leopard print body paint on too.

Who took the photo? 

I took the photo as a dare. All night G had been admiring the woman’s arse, and we made it a silly game to try and get a photo of her bum without her knowing. It would have been perfect if G had not decided to grab his drink at the same time. Incidentally, we had the cleanest table in the place that night as the young glass collector kept coming by for an ogle!

Where is the camera that took it?

This was probably taken on a disposable camera from Boots. I went through a ton of them that weekend as I had forgotten my proper camera. 

What made you send me this negative?

It has an arse on it. Everyone likes arses.

Text
August 28, 2010

These past few weeks I have come to realise how difficult it is to actually get hold of slides and negatives from people. Here’s what I THOUGHT would happen:

‘Oh that’s a good/interesting idea, I have some old negatives, I’d love to see what’s on them and have some copies!’.

Here’s what actually happens: 

‘Oh that’s a good/interesting idea, I have some old negatives, they’ve been in the loft for ages, I don’t really know where they are or what’s on them, I’ll give you some’.

Then they forget! :( I don’t mind, I can pester people until they do remember, but it’s so SAD! People, you have some of the most beautiful and moving photos hiding in boxes and lofts, with only the beetles that hide between them appreciating them. 

I wonder if we’ll hoard box upon box of CDs of digital pictures. Even then, they won’t be as interesting to go through as all the slides and negatives I’ve been seeing, and you’ll need a computer to do it, instead of just your hands, eyeballs and a source of light. 

Maybe I’ll start cat burlging people’s lofts and cupboards. They wouldn’t even notice, then I could post them the prints, and they would be double grateful - for the nice photos, and the highlighting of a security issue with their property. 

Photo
August 05, 2010
I finished going through Bill’s box today and came to a horrible conclusion. My fourty quid negative scanner is not up to the job of reproducing these pictures at all. Basically, everything it does is on auto, so this tiny stupid box decides how much light to shine through the negative and spits some pixels into my computer that barely even look like the original slide. It’s so frustrating holding the slide to light and seeing so many tiny details and beautiful colours, only to see it completely mangled by my scanner. The photo above is one such ruined picture. You can see Bill taking the photo, and Norma eating a cake in the refection on the window, but all the ornaments are over-exposed and lack detail, something that is not there on the original slide, it’s gorgeous.  I would seriously get better results taking photos of the negatives with my digital camera, but I don’t want to be messing around taping people’s old slides to my window. I’m not particularly butterfingered, but it would just be typical that I’d drop them, then the dog would stand on them with soiled paws, then eat them, them poo them out, then stand on them again. Then do more poo on them. At first I thought I was being pedantic but putting up pixelized, rubbish pictures chewed up and ruined by computers is completely defeating the object of the project. What started out as an experiment in lowbrow and nackered, uncared for negatives has turned into something else; just because Bill tried to throw his slides away doesn’t mean they aren’t priceless to the rest of his family, or his pictures interesting or beautiful enough to be appreciated by people who never even knew him.  So, I’ve had to plea for help, something I hate doing because I despise thinking I might be inconveniencing someone. Luckily one of my best friends, the lovely, Russian Doll collecting, vintage ballgown swishing Alex Bloundele, is going out with photo nerd called Jason Hynes; he has some very good work and just co-curated a great analog based exhibition in Middlesbrough (where putting on ANY kind of exhibition is difficult, unless it’s about steel, or the football club). He has a proper, un-embarrassing negative scanner and helped me out when I got some negatives from a lovely lady called Caroline; they were an odd format and too big to go in my CRAP SCANNER THAT I HATE!! So, he might be on board. He also might not, in which case, I don’t know what to do. I need to concentrate on Uni come October, hell I SHOULD be concentrating on it now. So getting a negative scanner with my loan will be too late. I suppose I could max my overdraft, but I already did that once for the Mac. And I owe my Nana hundreds too. BALLS.  Either way, check him out. If you like photos of hotel rooms, strangers and objects you will be jealous of his skills.  http://www.jasonhynes.com/ http://www.flickr.com/groups/pistolandfur/ http://pistolandfur.tumblr.com/

I finished going through Bill’s box today and came to a horrible conclusion. My fourty quid negative scanner is not up to the job of reproducing these pictures at all. Basically, everything it does is on auto, so this tiny stupid box decides how much light to shine through the negative and spits some pixels into my computer that barely even look like the original slide. It’s so frustrating holding the slide to light and seeing so many tiny details and beautiful colours, only to see it completely mangled by my scanner. The photo above is one such ruined picture. You can see Bill taking the photo, and Norma eating a cake in the refection on the window, but all the ornaments are over-exposed and lack detail, something that is not there on the original slide, it’s gorgeous. 

I would seriously get better results taking photos of the negatives with my digital camera, but I don’t want to be messing around taping people’s old slides to my window. I’m not particularly butterfingered, but it would just be typical that I’d drop them, then the dog would stand on them with soiled paws, then eat them, them poo them out, then stand on them again. Then do more poo on them.

At first I thought I was being pedantic but putting up pixelized, rubbish pictures chewed up and ruined by computers is completely defeating the object of the project. What started out as an experiment in lowbrow and nackered, uncared for negatives has turned into something else; just because Bill tried to throw his slides away doesn’t mean they aren’t priceless to the rest of his family, or his pictures interesting or beautiful enough to be appreciated by people who never even knew him. 

So, I’ve had to plea for help, something I hate doing because I despise thinking I might be inconveniencing someone. Luckily one of my best friends, the lovely, Russian Doll collecting, vintage ballgown swishing Alex Bloundele, is going out with photo nerd called Jason Hynes; he has some very good work and just co-curated a great analog based exhibition in Middlesbrough (where putting on ANY kind of exhibition is difficult, unless it’s about steel, or the football club). He has a proper, un-embarrassing negative scanner and helped me out when I got some negatives from a lovely lady called Caroline; they were an odd format and too big to go in my CRAP SCANNER THAT I HATE!!

So, he might be on board. He also might not, in which case, I don’t know what to do. I need to concentrate on Uni come October, hell I SHOULD be concentrating on it now. So getting a negative scanner with my loan will be too late. I suppose I could max my overdraft, but I already did that once for the Mac. And I owe my Nana hundreds too. BALLS. 

Either way, check him out. If you like photos of hotel rooms, strangers and objects you will be jealous of his skills. 

http://www.jasonhynes.com/

http://www.flickr.com/groups/pistolandfur/

http://pistolandfur.tumblr.com/

Tags: bill photo

Photoset
August 02, 2010

Bill’s photos…

Bill was going to throw all these slides away while clearing out his house, which he was selling after his Wife passed away. I sat around the table while his Wife’s sister (my Nana) held them all up to the light, trying to figure out who was in what and where they were. Bill has moved away so we might never know where some of these pictures were taken. I’ll have to ask my Nana to answer the questions about the final few I choose for the project - I don’t know how I’m going to pick out of this many. This is tiny sample. 

I’ve only had time to have a quick first look through Bill’s slides, but he was obviously a well travelled gent, proud of his family, with a good eye for a photograph and a good camera to take them with. I feel a bit fragile after looking through just a few, I feel like I’m trespassing in someone’s memories like an ignorant fool. 

Tags: bill photos

Photo
July 26, 2010
Here is an ‘outtake’ from the first batch of negatives I got through the post! I like how they have painted a lovely tree on the concrete wall of his enclosure, aww. I was sent this batch from my friend Tabby, who now lives Cities away with her lovely family.  She mentioned that I might be in one of the photos. UH OH. Most of mine and Tabby’s friendship pre-internet consisted of being pissed in the same grotty nightclub, in various sweaty goth clothes and bondage gear. I was jealous of her PVC trousers, she has great legs. To compete with her shiny thighs and serpentine dancing (bitch) I would show up with my tits sellotaped into the smallest nurses outfit possible, or just wrap myself in clingfilm. So you can understand why I might not want photo evidence of those days. Luckily I was nowhere to be seen.  I chose 3 photos from Tabby to ask her about; one of an almost bare bottom in thigh high leopardprint boots, one of an interesting looking german (I think) goth girl, and a contrastingly serene one of a peacock in a field, which is so lovely I might put it on the wall. If anyone sends me ANY photos of birds they are almost guaranteed to go up, seeing as I am even horny for pigeons, the rats of the bird world. Tabby is still answering my nosey questions about her photos; I must thank her for sending me the negatives dead fast and also passing the project on via her Facebook :) I’m accepting negatives til October, send send send! xx

Here is an ‘outtake’ from the first batch of negatives I got through the post! I like how they have painted a lovely tree on the concrete wall of his enclosure, aww.

I was sent this batch from my friend Tabby, who now lives Cities away with her lovely family.  She mentioned that I might be in one of the photos. UH OH. Most of mine and Tabby’s friendship pre-internet consisted of being pissed in the same grotty nightclub, in various sweaty goth clothes and bondage gear. I was jealous of her PVC trousers, she has great legs. To compete with her shiny thighs and serpentine dancing (bitch) I would show up with my tits sellotaped into the smallest nurses outfit possible, or just wrap myself in clingfilm. So you can understand why I might not want photo evidence of those days. Luckily I was nowhere to be seen. 

I chose 3 photos from Tabby to ask her about; one of an almost bare bottom in thigh high leopardprint boots, one of an interesting looking german (I think) goth girl, and a contrastingly serene one of a peacock in a field, which is so lovely I might put it on the wall. If anyone sends me ANY photos of birds they are almost guaranteed to go up, seeing as I am even horny for pigeons, the rats of the bird world.

Tabby is still answering my nosey questions about her photos; I must thank her for sending me the negatives dead fast and also passing the project on via her Facebook :)

I’m accepting negatives til October, send send send! xx

Text
July 23, 2010

WELCOME


To Stray Treasure, a place where negatives that have hibernated for years in a shoebox or a carrierbag have a moment of glory once more.

I decided to run this project for a few months over the summer after a couple of incidents with my family, and the purchase of a negative scanner, who shall be known as ‘Dot’ from now on, seeing as it has a penchant for adding large cylinders of light to pictures for no reason I can see. 

The incidents with my family weren’t as dramatic as I have made them sound. Actually I wasn’t even present at one of them - my Mum went to help clear out her deceased Aunt’s house, a sad task by all accounts. While tidying, she came across a box of slides and negatives, which her Aunt’s Husband was just going to bin. At the time, my Mum had no idea what she was even going to do with them; having no knowledge of photo developing whatsoever, only knowing that there was many other members in the family who would love to see the photos.

Around the same time, I was having a chat with my Grandparents, and they were saying how hard it was to get digital photos printed. This is despite the help of family in the form of a computer, a camera, and digital photo frames. You might laugh (I did, a bit) but how often do we take our reams of digital photos to get developed? When I suggested that they might want to use one of their old film cameras, it took me a good 20 minutes to convince them that film wasn’t extinct.

This all lead me to wondering what kind of unseen treasures people might be sitting on, not knowing how easy it is to get them out and loved again. 

This blog will show the photos resulting from the negatives I have been posted, the stories that go with them, and posts about the progress of the project and any events around it.

I AM ACCEPTING NEGATIVES UNTIL OCTOBER 2010. Please see the website if you want to be involved! STRAY TREASURE WEBSITE!

Danielle xx